<![CDATA[SurveyGold - Blog]]>Sun, 09 Nov 2025 03:05:02 -0700Weebly<![CDATA[SurveyGold is Compatible with Windows 11]]>Tue, 05 Oct 2021 06:00:00 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/surveygold-is-compatible-with-windows-12The SurveyGold application runs on the following Windows operating systems:
  • Windows 11
  • Windows 10
​
Web survey forms created using SurveyGold are compatible with all web browsers running on any operating system.]]><![CDATA[How We Handled the DDOS Attack]]>Tue, 01 Oct 2019 03:34:45 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/how-we-handled-the-ddos-attackWe apologize for the disruption of service. These are unprecedented times at SurveyGold, as we experienced yet another set of distributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks over this past weekend.

It was the fourth such attack in five days. In over 20 years of being in business, we have never endured such a sustained level of attack. When these attacks occur they flood our network with extraordinary levels of traffic, which brings our network traffic to a standstill, thus effectively crippling our services.

Often times these attacks are random and they come and go like an episode of bad weather. In this particular episode, the attacker is an unknown but intentional person who has expressed malicious intent against our SurveyGold domain and many others that are hosted by our internet hosting provider.

The heinous attacker has circumvented each mitigation we have introduced... until now. As of late last night we have physically moved our servers and introduced a sophisticated solution which employs technology specifically designed to detect and deflect such attacks.

New internet address for surveygold.com: 38.89.141.118

If you work in an institutional setting where your access to the Internet is controlled by a corporate policy, we recommend that you provide this new internet address to your IT support staff so that they can add the new surveygold.com internet address to the whitelist of acceptable addresses.

How to Speed Up Your Restoration of Service

All SurveyGold online services are fully functional and available at this time. If you are still experiencing issues with being able to save an online survey or collect responses, this is a transient condition that will resolve itself today while our new server location is propagated to your computer through a process known as DNS propagation.

​One thing that you can try to speed up the DNS propagation process is to clear the list of internet addresses (known as the DNS cache) that your Windows operating system maintains:
  1. ​Launch Windows command prompt console as follows:
    Press the Windows+R key combination in order to open the Run dialog box. Type the following command and click the OK button: cmd
    (This opens the Windows command line prompt in a box, which provides a primitive way of interacting with the Windows operating system.)
  2. Flush the DNS cache as follows:
    On the command line that appears, type this command and press Enter: ipconfig /flushdns
    (You can then click the X to close the command line box.)

This “resets” the set of internet addresses maintained on your computer. This will not break anything on your computer. It just means that your computer will create and maintain a new list of internet addresses that it manages locally on your computer…as you visit websites with your browser (e.g., Chrome) and as applications like SurveyGold access the surveygold.com website for necessary online services.
]]><![CDATA[Email Survey Campaigns: End-of-Service Announcement]]>Thu, 17 Jan 2019 21:09:22 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/email-survey-campaigns-end-of-service-announcementEffective March 31, 2019, we will permanently discontinue the Email Survey Campaign feature currently available via the SurveyGold application.

After that date, the Email Survey Campaign feature will no longer be functional. We will not be able to process any email survey campaigns after March 31, 2019. We sincerely appreciate your support and regret any inconvenience this necessary action causes subscribers. If you have any questions regarding these changes, please contact us.

What Is Affected
This change in service affects all application features and online services related to:
  • Adding, changing or removing an Email Survey Campaign 
  • Sending/re-sending emails via an Email Survey Campaign
  • Viewing respondent detail for an Email Survey Campaign

What Is Not Affected
All other email-related features of SurveyGold online services will continue to function. These include, but are not limited to:
  • Emails containing an auto-responder message when a respondent submits an online survey
  • Emails containing responses submitted via an online survey
  • Emails containing service instructions to field surveyors and shared responses subscribers

Why This Decision Was Made
This decision allows us to more clearly focus on developing solutions for survey authors and their collaborating partners. This allows our subscribers who conduct online surveys using SurveyGold to leverage existing world-class email campaign solution providers, such as MailChimp, to distribute their online surveys.

Actions To Take
We strongly suggest that all SurveyGold subscribers:]]><![CDATA[Changes Coming: FastSpring for Subscription Billing]]>Tue, 09 Oct 2018 02:19:53 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/changes-coming-fastspring-for-subscription-billingThank you for using SurveyGold. We want to let you know that we're making some changes to your subscription billing as we announce our new e-commerce partner, FastSpring.

If you have a monthly or annual subscription with automatic renewal then continue reading to understand how this affects you.

If your automatic subscription renewal is scheduled to occur:
  • On or before December 31, 2018, your subscription renewal will be processed as usual via our current e-commerce partner, SWREG.

  • After December 31, 2018, you must initiate purchasing a renewal as follows:

    Individual subscribers (Standard or Premium subscription) can purchase a subscription renewal via our new e-commerce partner, FastSpring. Your purchase is initiated via the SurveyGold application when it prompts you to renew. So, be sure to update your SurveyGold application before renewing so that the new FastSpring order form is available to you.

    Team subscribers (Ultimate subscription) can purchase a subscription renewal as usual via the SurveyGold Team Portal.
After you purchase a subscription renewal via FastSpring, and if you elect to automatically renew, your subscription will continue to be renewed via FastSpring in the future. As always, an email is sent out one week prior to the automatic renewal period so that you have the choice to cancel your subscription prior to being billed.

If you have any questions regarding these changes, please contact us at support@surveygold.com.]]><![CDATA[SurveyGold and SurveyMonkey Comparison]]>Wed, 27 Jul 2016 03:06:22 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/surveygold-and-surveymonkey-comparisonWe often get asked how SurveyGold compares to other survey solutions. Here is a comparison of SurveyGold and SurveyMonkey.
 
Online Surveys
Paper Surveys
Offline Surveys
Mobile Surveys
​Author Uses
SurveyGold
​✓
​✓
✓
✓
Windows App
SurveyMonkey
​✓
 
 
 
Browser App
  • SurveyMonkey is a browser-based survey solution used to conduct browser-based online surveys by a single surveyor who authors and conducts the online surveys. 
  • SurveyGold is a computer-based survey solution used to conduct browser-based online surveys, paper surveys and offline surveys by a single surveyor who authors the surveys. It is also used to conduct surveys via mobile devices used by any number of field surveyors who are working in collaboration with the survey author.

Both offer free and paid subscription levels.

SurveyGold paid subscriptions cost less than comparable SurveyMonkey paid subscription prices. SurveyGold offers a 30% discount for non-profit, government and academic institutions (staff and students). SurveyMonkey offers a 31% to 32% discount for non-profit and academic institutions (staff and students).

SurveyMonkey provides high-end features such as statistical significance, text analysis, question & answer piping and randomization not provided by SurveyGold.

SurveyGold provides white-label branding support for all free and paid subscription levels. SurveyMonkey only provides white-label branding via its most expensive subscription. White-label refers to the ability to remove all brand references (e.g., to SurveyGold or SurveyMonkey logos or brand name or online survey link URLs) from the respondent's online survey experience.

Regarding security and data protection, SurveyGold provides and maintains PCI compliance across all free and paid subscription levels. SurveyMonkey provides and maintains HIPAA compliance for its most expensive subscription. PCI establishes a level of compliance for the payment card industry. HIPAA establishes a level of compliance for the healthcare industry. Both PCI and HIPAA provide a substantial level of information security for processing of personal identifying information.
]]><![CDATA[New Feature: Publish a Set of Reports Using Memorized Filters]]>Wed, 25 May 2016 01:34:43 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/new-feature-publish-a-set-of-reports-using-memorized-filters
We just released a SurveyGold application update that enables new productivity-enhancing features.

The Publish Word action in the Analyze Results tab now has the ability to produce a set of reports based upon memorized filters.  The View Results tab now has the ability to automatically create a set of memorized filters based upon the response choices for a particular question.

This combination of features makes it quick and easy to produce a set of reports whereby each report contains only those respondents who answered a question in a particular way.

This feature is useful when conducting assessments (e.g., 360 degree employee reviews) or when reports need to be produced based upon demographic data (e.g., respondent zip code). 

Learn how it works in this mercifully brief tutorial.

​How to Acquire the Update

To acquire SurveyGold this application update:
  • Select About in the SurveyGold application tool bar. 
  • Perform the Update SurveyGold action.

A software update dialog appears and the process begins by downloading the software directly from SurveyGold online services. After the software update files are downloaded to your computer, the process automatically installs the software updates. Normally, this entire process only takes a moment. Your data is not affected in any way as a result of software updates.
]]><![CDATA[New Feature Automatically Collects/Shares Survey Responses ]]>Fri, 01 Apr 2016 03:07:50 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/new-feature-automatically-collectsshares-survey-responsesWe just released a SurveyGold application update that enables a new productivity-enhancing feature.

SurveyGold automatically performs the Update Activity action when the SurveyGold application is idle for a specific number of minutes (defaults to 15 minutes and can be changed via system preferences.)

This means that if you leave your SurveyGold application running (e.g., as you leave the office or leave for vacation), it will perform the Update Activity action every 15 minutes while you are gone. This will automatically collect any new web survey responses and field survey responses. It will also automatically share any newly collected responses. This feature can be disabled via system preferences.

How to Acquire the Update

​To acquire SurveyGold application updates:
  1. Select About in the SurveyGold application tool bar. 
  2. Perform the Update SurveyGold action.

A software update dialog appears and the process begins by downloading the software directly from the SurveyGold software update server. After the software update files are downloaded to your computer, the process automatically installs the software updates. Normally, this entire process only takes a moment. Your data is not affected in any way as a result of software updates.
]]><![CDATA[How To Distribute an Online Survey using MailChimp®]]>Wed, 30 Mar 2016 21:04:51 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/how-to-distribute-a-web-survey-using-mailchimpr
Distributing a SurveyGold online survey form using MailChimp® is quick and easy. Learn how in this mercifully brief video tutorial
]]><![CDATA[Your Survey Data Is Flawed, and What To Do About It]]>Thu, 17 Mar 2016 18:42:31 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/your-survey-data-is-flawed-and-what-to-do-about-itRecent research suggests that one in five surveys contains fraudulent data. This is a major problem, especially if you using survey data to inform your decisions.

​Paul Young, from Pragmatic Marketing, points out that "data is just data, and before we draw conclusions, there is a set of sanity checks we need to run against the data first."
Read More...
]]><![CDATA[Track Survey Activity Via the Survey Pulse Feature]]>Thu, 18 Feb 2016 04:28:35 GMThttps://www.surveygoldsolutions.com/blog/track-survey-activity-via-the-survey-pulse-feature
Survey Pulse is a feature in the Dashboard tab of the SurveyGold application that makes it easy to track your survey activity.
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